LibDem Blogs - Archived! - Monday 4th June 2007

Leamington to be Concreted Over.

Well that's how it seems after reading the stories hitting the news over the past few weeks. First we heard that a developer (George Wimpy) had been in discussion with the Cricket Club in Arlington Road and also the Tennis Club in Guys Cliffe Avenue with a proposal to build on their grounds. Then we heard how the Binswood allotments could be under threat from development from the very same developer. I attended the public meeting held at the Cricket Club a couple of weeks ago and heard both sides of the story. I can see that ...

Foodie heaven

I'm through in Perth again this weekend as Catherine has a meeting from 10 o'clock until the back of four - yep, Soroptimists again. Whilst she's stuck in her meeting her Dad & I are planning to pay a visit to Edinburgh to visit Channel 4's "Taste of Edinburgh" event which is being held in The Meadows from the 7th - 10th of this month. There are three different entry levels and I'm planning on doing the £25 one which gets you in and also gives you 30 "crowns" to spend on grub and booze. There are 15 ...

The Man Who Would Be Dobson

Dobson was a great collector of coupons. Almost all coupons are redeemable in one form or another, but not in Dobson’s world. “Do not even think of urging me to redeem any of my coupons!” he shouted, more than once, when it was gently suggested to him that he was sitting on a fortune in [...]

Soroptimists are off the hook

In a previous post I railed against Catherine's Glasgow Soroptimist Conference depriving me of her active participation in most of my Birthday this year and also meaning we would not be able to get away for our usual early August break. I'm delighted to be able to recant and inform that either Catherine or her Mum had got the dates wrong. Catherine blames her Mum for this but I have my doubts! Anyway, it means that I get the pleasure of her company for all of my birthday and we also get 4 days in Dublin, a city ...

Bryson at his best

I bought Bill Bryson's "Life & Times of the Thunderbolt Kid" a few days back, which is the story of his childhood in Des Moines. Having enjoyed all of his previous books I thought that it would be a good read. Well I certainly wasn't let down. It's absolutely side-splittingly hilarious and in certain parts had my crying with laughter. Indeed from time to time I had to stop reading it as I was hurting too much from laughing. It is recently published in paperback by Black Swan and it's RRP is £7.99. www.billbryson.co.uk

More from Jonathan Meades

No, I don't understand Hooting Yard either, but this posting points the way to two interviews with the great man.

Park Ward Liberal Democrats to select

After Robin Lawrence won Park Ward in May for the Liberal Democrats, we are in need of a new candidate for next year's elections (Robin is now elected until 2011).

Taking A Little More Of Leo's Advice

I usually refrain from commenting on "news", normally because I'm hopping mad about it and this is not conducive to my writing. But I couldn't allow Ming's Independent Q&A to pass without some mention of his critical inconsistency. When asked about Cameron stealing our environmental clothes, Ming gives the answer Leo would give, not accepting the premise of the question. But when asked about the

Theresa May's schooldays

In the course of a column describing the change in culture brought about by the merger of a grammar and comprehensive school near Oxford, Peter Hitchens casts an interesting light on the schooldays of Theresa May: What makes this spare, sad account of an avoidable, mournful little moment in our history is that the school involved was being attended, at exactly this time, by Theresa May, or Theresa Brasier as she was then. It was Holton Park girls' grammar school, a few miles outside the City of Oxford (close to Forest Hill where John Milton's wife grew up) now long ...

If someone had told me ten years ago ...

I'm getting a new car and it is a Skoda. I am of that age group that grew up with Skoda jokes and I never thought in a million years I'd own one, but I've been seduced by the new Fabia and those wonderful adverts. To be honest, when I drove it, it was a lovely car, loads of features, handles well and projected resale values are excellent, so I can't go wrong and, with a baby on the way, it is a five door car. The funny thing is though that the children I ...

Five Live tonight

Assuming we're not bumped by events, on BBC Five Live tonight (23:20) in my capacity as a school governor to talk about whether or not the current system of school governance is failing in disadvantaged schools, preceding a report released tomorrow by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. I commented at the beginning of last month about whether or not too much was expected of volunteer governors in today's highly regulated school environment. So it's interesting to see much of the focus of the report is around whether expectations need to be scaled back, whether the government need to facilitate the ...

Festival City

It was the Bedlam Fayre at the Fringe yesterday. Lots of free street entertainment in several locations around the city. The best though again was the SpiegelTent located for the fourth year on the Recreation Ground. These are wonderful 1930s creations from Belgium and provide a great temporary venue. Ours has been put on each year by Edinburgh Labour Councillor Ian Murray (voted 37th most...

The hidden costs of the new 2012 logo.

The response to the launch of the new brand for London 2012 has been lukewarm at best. 'Bloody embarrassing' and 'makes you want to emigrate rather than face the shame of it' were two of the more positive comments in our office this lunchtime. Now as a public sector worker I'm used to crap branding chosen by committees who have the visual sense of Stevie Wonder. So what worries me is how much is

Iain Dale gets his claws into David Mellor

Here's a thoroughly enjoyable rant by Iain Dale against David Mellor on Five Live: David Mellor has just illustrated why the Tories have been out of power for ten years. He described David Cameron as glib, superficial and flimsy - there's certainly a danger of Mellor looking like that, as well as arrogant. Some of us in the Tory Party are sick and tired of hearing from failed relics like him. He

The death of Tony Bastable

A little bit of my childhood disappeared today when I read the obituary of Tony Bastable. As well as being a keen fan of Blue Peter, I also watched Magpie religiously. The broadcasters intelligently put them on different days so you could watch both. Bastable was an excellent and engaging presenter. It is sad to hear of his death.

Brazil's Lula is saying what our PM should be saying about Bush

Thank goodness for President Lula of Brazil and his clear rejection of George Bush's proposal of a parallel climate change initiative. While it is a step forward for the USA to be talking about agreeing to carbon reduction targets, Bush's proposals are cynical and oafish. He is obviously trying to head off getting rail-roaded at the G8 conference. To invent a process outside of the UN is just

The madness of our insolvency laws

So Ken Bates rules supreme at Elland Road once again. According to the BBC Ken Bates put the club into administration with debts of £35m. He needed 75% of creditors votes to buy the club back and after a recount got 75.2% of the creditors to back his plan which gives them just 1p in the £1. Superficially one might say all well and good but there are a lot of other factors at play here. At the creditors meeting there were 6 bids in total 5 from UK bidders and one from the USA. ...

What does London 2012 have in common with Dave Cameron?

Every so often I'm relieved to find that whatever mistakes I may make, someone else has just made a far more expensive one. This happened this afternoon, when I started to see people complaining about the new London Olympics logo, which has cost £400,000 and, erm, polarises opinion. In that everybody seems to hate it, apart from miscellaneous celebs and politicians at the launch. It's all about opportunity, inspiration, excitement and connecting with young people. Right. I know just enough about marketing and young people to guess where they've gone wrong. The logo is indeed very vibrant, colourful ...

Change The London 2012 Logo - Online Petition

Change The London 2012 Logo - Online Petition If anyone else thinks, as I do, that the new London 2012 logo is utterly awful - this petition is for you!

When will it be curtains for Ming?

The people like him (kinda), we respect him (mostly) and he hasn't actually made any serious cockups. So why is it that Ming's leadership is currently looking rather shaky? The obvious reasons are charisma (or rather a lack of) combined with dissapointment (we are now consistently 3-5% below the poll ratings we were getting 2 years ago) but I think it is also a little bit of over ambition on our parts. We know Ming doesn't quite seem to have it (only around 5% of the population think Ming would be the best Prime Minister) but that was true also ...

Ming encouraged by popularity of Statler and Waldorf

It was good to see two pages of the Independent today given over to Menzies Campbell answering questions from readers. It was particularly good to read this question and answer: Both Labour and the Conservatives have moved away from conventional left and right-wing policies to occupy the traditionally Liberal Democrat-dominated centre ground. Where does this leave the Liberal Democrats? LUKE

How green is David Cameron?

The leading article in the Independent today is generally sympathetic to David Cameron's green efforts. However, it notes a visit by the Independent on Sunday to his newly refurbished West London home: The windmill has come down because the roof was not strong enough. The composter does not work because it kept filling with water. And the gardener grows the prize-winning vegetables of which he

The fascination of food labels

I have a theory that the labels and packets of household items are some of the most widely read literature in the world. I found myself yesterday with nothing to do while I ate my toast, so I read the label of the Branston pickle jar. Growing up, I remember that my brother used to regularly read the Cornflake packet. It's amazing what nuggets of information you pick up from a food label. What is

Fixing the Assessment - BBC Look North

The link is to the BBC's Look North TV programme. I saw the package before I did an additional interview for this programme. What was key in the interview of the ex-Social Worker was that she confirmed that assessments are fixed to achieve the outcome that the Local Authority wants. This is a key piece of the jigsaw as it demonstrates bias and why the decisions of the Family Courts are

Nogo for Logo

I’m not the most sporty person in the world, and as such I’ve tended to keep my mouth shut about the ever escalating costs of the London Olympics lest I be dismissed as a killjoy. But the unveiling of their new logo today does suggest that collective insanity has broken out amongst the Olympics [...]

Surplus School Places

More grist to the School Voucher debate mill: The number of surplus school places in England has risen to 758,000 - the highest level since 1998. This is the equivalent of more than 2,000 average-sized primary and 250 secondary schools lying empty. Later on it states that 12% of Primary School places and 7% of Secondary School [...]

Friendly Fire

Cicero does not usually believe in attacking people on his own side. There are very few Lib Dems with whom I have very many profound disagreements. However there is one figure in the party who I am beginning to use as a lodestone: if he opposes something, it is usually right, if he supports it, it is usually wrong. It is not only that his opinions tend not to be in accordance with mine, it is also that he usually expresses his views with a degree of intemperance which compounds whichever error he wishes to make. The ...

Do we really want to buy gas off someone who points missiles at us ?

Russia says it will start aiming missiles at us again but then expects us to buy their natural resources. I don't know about everyone else, but I found their record of turning gas on and off last year pretty loathsome, and the way UK businesses have been treated in Russia, particularly the way Shell and BP have had to sell off their interests to the Russian state owned Gazprom is pretty shabby too. Using more renewable energy, being less reliant on fossil fuels, and in particularly Russian gas, as a good enough thing to do on the basis ...

New London 2012 logo

What can I say. It is cheap (well at £400,000 it is expensive). It will date. It looks like the titles to 1980s Art Attack - it is just BAD, WRONG and a thousand other expletives. The ribbon logo could have stayed for a few more years - then had a freshen up for the event itself. And if you want to see it in full animated, fit inducing, steroid driven BADNESS watch this video (sorry not on

Different country, same old Conservatives

Full marks to the Young Liberals of Canada for these fantastic adverts, managing to spoof both those annoying Mac adverts and the Conservatives’ constant attempts to rebrand themselves as something they’re not (sound familiar?). Enjoy! Share This

Labour councillor banned from football matches after racist abuse

Cllr David Phythian, a Conservative Labour member of West Lancashire District Council, has been given a three-year football banning order by Wigan and Leigh Magistrates Court. He admitted “using abusive or insulting words … that were racially aggravated” towards Wigan Athletic defender Pascal Chimbonda. The Wigan Today website reports: Wigan and Leigh magistrates banned him from attending [...]

Government hypocrisy over Eco Villages

Although it is good news that the government are now supporting the principle of ecologically friendly eco villages, it does seem, yet again, to smack of absolute hypocrisy given the government's record of support for such schemes in the recent past. In North Norfolk, with the closure many years ago of RAF West Raynham, dozens of RAF houses were left to rot for many years. In this time, North Norfolk District Council with others offered to take over these homes, buy them if necessary for a decent rate, and turn the site in to an environmentally friendly model of ...

London 2012 Logo or Banzai Channel Four Logo ?

Is it just me or does the new London 2012 Olympic logo, unveiled today, look more like one of the logos used on Channel Four's Banzai ? This is the "place your bet now" logo from Banzai and it looks as if it has been designed by the same person. I hope this does not mean that we will have hand shaking as an Olympic sport.

Aim for toe, pull trigger

They’re a strange bunch, the Tories. After the twin troughs of IDS and Michael Howard, they were finally achieving some sustained polling credibility. Cameron’s ‘nice, green tory’ image was beginning to make them look like they were modernising. The general public were beginning to buy into this, which was reflected in a modest growth in [...]

A little poem.

Feeling rather inspired by that adam curtis documentary i recently saw, The Trap, what happened to our dreams of freedom? dreaming We live to dream or dream to live but few can see the truth, That millions all around the world live happy with heads aloof; And while I dream of living in my empty beige-warm room, I muse upon those with heads screwed on who lead us to our doom. For plutocrats and gigolos and merchant bankers too, Lead us to material gain at expense of heart and soul. To ...

Australian Democrats on YouTube

And now, foreign news. Our sister party in Australia, the Australian Democrats, have started making greater use of the Internet this year, including a YouTube channel from Lyn Allison, the party’s leader. They’re not new to innovative web campaigning though - one of their senators, Andrew Bartlett, has been blogging for quite some time.

Let's all go down... to the Den

Local Lib Dem councillor Eliza Mann recently tried a new approach to tackling anti-social behaviour among young people in Riverside Ward. Although side by side with the world renowned Bankside district on the River Thames, the ward has some of the most deprived parts of Bermondsey and higher than average unemployment rates. There are regular complaints about anti-social behaviour and talk in the local papers about a 'no-go area' for Police. Eliza took 35 young people from Riverside to a recent Millwall league match using tickets donated by the club. The only precondition for being able to go was that ...

Debrand your P990 / M600 for FREE

Following on from my most sucessful blog post ever, we now have a method to debrand your UIQ3 phone for free. No more Vodafone or Orange customisation! However this method is slightly more complicated than using KulanKendiClient, so if you’re not too sure for only €6 KulanKendiClient is still worthwhile. As per anything which involves changing the phones [...]

Greening Burgess Park

Last week Cllr Lisa Rajan, Lib Dem Executive Member for Environment, joined volunteers from the Royal Bank of Scotland, co-ordinated by Groundwork and BTCV (British Trust of Conservation Volunteers) and local residents on a project to create a natural wootpath through the New Church Road Nature Reserve in Burgess Park, Camberwell. The volunteers cleared sycamores to thin out the woodland area. The trees were then used to create pathways and a dead hedge to encourage local wildlife. They a lso planted reeds in the lake with members of the Burgess Park Fishing Club. About 60 volunteers from the bank ...

Grange Centre - Concern continues

There is still a lot of concern about the future of the Grange Centre - a part of Southwark College which provides courses for people with learning difficulties. The College proposes to close the centre and relocate the courses to other venues. Students and their parents are concerned that this will lead to a loss of skills and of support services. There is still a lot of confusion and frustration felt by the service users. There still has been no real consultation with these vulnerable adults who are being moved to the Southwark College site at Keetons Rd, Bermondsey. In ...

The lib dems are now official supporters of world democracy!

I try to keep up on the standard liberal blogs but it seems to me that something has slipped through the web almost completely unnoticed. In April 2007 the campaign for a UN parliamentary assembly was launched. It had launching ceremonies in quite a few countries all over 5 continents including a small event here in London. Although ignored by the main stream press it seems that our party leaders (Ming Campbell and Vince Cable are on the signatories list) have signed up to the program. I wont go through the details, George Monbiot has done a far better job ...

Highbury and Islington station is now on the Northern Line

You would have thought Transport for London would know where their own tube stations are ... but as this photo of one of the signs at Finsbury Park shows, they don't! (Here's a hint: Highbury and Islington isn't on the Northern Line...). Time for a quick email to TfL methinks... (Click on the photo for a big version)

How not to send an email

Harriet Harman’s campaign for Labour Deputy Leader doesn’t really seem to be at the cutting edge of technology: sending out an email to several hundred councillors and sticking all their addresses in the to/cc fields is just asking for an unhappy recipient to hit “reply all” … and indeed they did. (It’s also highly questionable data protection [...]

Make the G8 stick to their promises

Two years ago the main world leaders at the G8 summit made a number of promises on overseas aid. Oxfam is continuing its campaign to ensure they stick to their promises, as we come up to the next G8 summit. I was out in the town centre on Saturday collecting signatures (with the Chelmsford Make Trade Fair campaign). There is an online email/petition you can sign, on their website: G8 Summit 2007

Wow my first post

hmm this is interesting just set up this blog I'm a liberal (a bit of a radical one) and I've been a blogger for quite a while now. I'm an active lib dem member so be sure to here comments about my experiences in the party. anyway I'll get this thing up and running first and then maybe get a few seerous posts through.atom.xml

When you hear the air attack warning

As the malign elven creature currently occupying the Kremlin announces that he’s ready to enter an “arms race in Europe,” (that is to say nuke us all) it’s worth spending a moment considering just how zany world peace is. Mr Putin summarises "The strategic balance in the world is being upset and in order to restore this balance without creating an anti-missile defence on our territory, we will be creating a system of countering that anti-missile system."

D- Notice

On the day when Putin decides that it is easier just to point nuclear weapons at Europe, rather than engage in a political debate it may be worth asking some interesting questions about what the UK is doing about the practical threat from Russia: How many Russian diplomats have been asked to leave London in the past six weeks "for activities incompatible with their diplomatic status"? How many Russian private citizens have been refused entry to the United Kingdom over the same period on grounds of a threat to UK national security? How many Russian citizens have ...

Time for a Debate on the Middle East

The newly-formed Liberal Democrat Friends of Palestine launches its website today (www.ldpf.eu), in advance of Saturday’s Palestine March in London, marking 40 years of Israeli occupation of territory seized during the Six Day War. Significantly, the site — which includes a message from the organisation’s president, (Lord) David Steel, the former Liberal leader – displays both the Israeli and [...]

Your questions answered

Ming is profiled in today’s Independent in an interview where he answered questions sent in by readers. Topics covered include the profile of the Liberal Democrats in the media, local taxation, Britain’s place in the world, and drugs policy. Read the full article here.

Brown's test for Ming

Ming set five tests for Gordon Brown, but Brown is setting a test of his own with new terrorism legislation plans

Tortuous and demeaning

Despite my little rant a few days ago about the separation of church and state, I believe that the Archbishop of Wales was absolutely right to publish his views on the Government of Wales Act this morning, and I am not saying that because I agree with him. There is of course a huge difference in a senior cleric expressing a view on a matter of public interest on one hand and seeking to influence the actions of individual politicians by the use of intimidation on the other. It is perfectly legitimate for churchmen and women to have ...

Monday morning

The weekend just gone was another busy one on the leafleting front, as we continued our Prestwich-wide "Thank-you"leaflet distribution. Everyone in St Mary's should have got one now, more or less, so on Saturday afternoon I started putting pen to paper on the new edition of Focus. Well, less "pen to paper" and more "Ariel font to blank MS Word document," but the former sounds more romantic. This

Another busy week ahead

Monday 4th June 2007 - Barely have I had time to draw breath after returning from a whirlwind tour of the Gulf States when it is time to head back to Brussels and a busy week ahead of me. The visit to Bahrain and Dubai was a fruitful one, providing an interesting and valuable insight into the economic developments in the oil rich Gulf states. Back in the UK I was delighted to attend the dinner

Puny And Dying

Yesterday I listened, belatedly, to a Little Atoms interview with Jonathan Meades. (It’s available for download here – the second one, dated 11 May 2007, though the earlier interview is well worth your attention too.) Each Little Atoms show has a musical interlude, often chosen by the guest. The magnificent Meades, perhaps the only reason [...]

Day 2343: The Emperor’s New Skull

Friday: So Mr Damian Hirst has taken fifty million pounds worth of platinum and diamonds and fashioned a jewel encrusted skull worth, er, fifty million pounds. This has been hailed as the most expensive piece of modern art. Hmmm, if someone would like to sponsor me to the tune of SIXTY million pounds, I think I can TOP THAT with my new conceptual piece “180 thousand ounces of Gold in disarranged bricks”. It could be a seller, don’t you think? PSAlso, the Big Kidney Donor Show turned out to be a SICK HOAX ...

Day 2342: Jesus H Bidmead!

Thursday: Daddy Alex's review of Logopolis has been touched by the HAND OF GOD! (Well, Daddy Richard is IMPRESSED!)

Day 2341: Dinosaur Theme Park

Wednesday: Oh very fluffy dear, America! I suppose that most of you already know about the BONKERS Disney ride that the Creationists have opened in Kentucky to “prove” that back in the Garden of Eden, little baby Cain and little baby Abel played nice with little baby Tyrannosaurus Rex. Sigh. We had to get the stepladder out to scrape Daddy Richard down off the ceiling, of course, after listening to the BBC’s Mr Justin Webb reporting from this Lala Land. In spite of his wry tone of “look, you’re kidding, right?”, Mr Justin still ...

Tories create "nice little number" for Tony?

How gallant of them! Tories advocate watchdog to monitor aid impact Larry Elliott Monday June 4, 2007 The Guardian The Conservatives last night called for this week's G8 summit in Germany to create a new international body to measure the effectiveness of aid spending as they warned that much of the west's development budget was being badly used. read more

Luntz's Logical Lapses?

Chrisco is back, after being rather busy travelling around Latin America and attempting to save the world (not at the same time). Readers of Liberal Review and Politicalbetting will know that I have in the past raised some questions about the practices of Frank Luntz (here) and here. It appears that we Irish seem to be much more skeptical about Dr. Luntz (anyone who saw the roasting he got from

BritBlog Roundup 120

This week's Roundup can be found at Philobiblon.

International Indian Film Academy Awards

The International Indian Film Academy Awards (IIFA), Bollywood's equivalent of the Oscars are coming to UK this year.

Monday 4th June 2007

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